


And They Gutted Us

by luckybarton



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Bruce Banner Is a Good Bro, Clint Barton (background) - Freeform, Clint Barton Is a Good Bro, Dehydration, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Nightmares, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Avengers (2012), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, References to Depression, Sleep Deprivation, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Whump, Whump Bingo, it's angst folks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 08:39:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13947903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luckybarton/pseuds/luckybarton
Summary: “No,” Steve said, struggling to get up, “no, don’t.” He staggered away from the sofa and into a wall, clearly using it to prop himself up. “See? Fine.”





	And They Gutted Us

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alexiel-neesan (alyyks)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alyyks/gifts).



Tony hadn’t expected Captain America’s place to be so much of a dump. It was, well—it was an okay apartment, but it looked like Steve hadn’t cleaned the place since he’d moved in a few months after the Battle of New York. He’d initially taken the radio silence as a sign to leave Cap alone, but after a set of missed phone calls and the dodged questions on the rare occasion they met each other—usually at some charity function, Steve didn’t bother with the press—Tony had decided to check in.

“Who’s there?” Steve shouted from another room, sounding somewhat strangled. Tony stepped through the doorway into the kitchen joined to the living room. The refrigerator, he noticed, had been moved out from the wall and unplugged, its cable lying across the linoleum floor among the thin layer of garbage that had accumulated.

“Steve,” Tony said, “it’s just me.”

If Tony didn’t already know alcohol couldn’t affect Steve, he would have sworn he looked drunk. He was slumped on a beat-up sofa and looking straight through him. “Go away,” he said, quietly. “It’s not—you can’t—”

Tony lifted an empty can of Red Bull from the floor, half-crushed. “Does this even do anything for you?”

“Don’t know,” Steve replied, unmoving. His hair was a mess, and he hadn’t shaved in at least a week. It wasn’t a good look.

“Steve, I’ve done the no-sleeping thing,” Tony said, “it isn’t pretty, and it’s not gonna help.”

“How’d you know,” Steve slurred, his eyes sliding shut as he spoke.

“Steve!” Tony shouted, and he blinked them back open, placidly glancing around the room.

“Tony?” Steve asked, in a small voice, “‘s that you?”

“I’m going to call Bruce,” Tony said, mostly for his own benefit. “Bruce’ll know...”

“No,” Steve said, struggling to get up, “no, don’t.” He staggered away from the sofa and into a wall, clearly using it to prop himself up. “See? Fine.”

“You should sit down,” Tony said, stepping toward Steve with caution. “Look, it’s either call Bruce or call 911, okay? There’s no option for me leaving you here like this.”

Steve let go of the wall and fell into it more. He closed his eyes. Tony grabbed him with both arms and lowered him to the ground. “Sorry,” Steve mumbled. Tony pulled his phone from a pocket and called Bruce, waiting for him to pick up.

“Bruce, it’s Tony,” he said as soon as Bruce was on the line. “I went to see Steve. He’s not doing so well. In fact, really, really badly. And—” 

Bruce cut him off to ask some questions.

“I don’t think he’s sleeping,” Tony confided, “I just—I didn’t know who else to call. I don’t want the media seeing him in this state.” He paused. “Yeah, I’ll put you on speaker.”

“Steve, can you hear me?” Bruce asked. Steve grunted. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay,” Steve slurred, “really, okay.”

“Do you know where you are?”

Steve glanced around. “N-no. Lehigh?”

“We’re in your apartment,” Tony said, “Brooklyn. Do you know who I am?”

“Tony,” he rasped.

“I’m going to have JARVIS send SHIELD Medical to your location,” Bruce said, “Steve. Do you understand that?”

Steve didn’t reply.

“Some people are coming to help you,” Bruce said, “they’ll be there in three minutes.”

“I’m gonna hang up,” Tony said, “Steve, let’s get you to the door.” He shoved his arms under Steve’s and they stumbled through the apartment, reaching the door as someone knocked at it. “Thank you,” Tony said. Steve being wheeled out of the building on a gurney was a sorry sight to see, and Tony was left wondering how he got to this state as he stepped into the back of the ambulance.

The rest of the evening was a blur. Steve had been administered saline and some kind of nutrient drip and was slowly becoming more coherent whenever he woke up, which, in Tony’s opinion, was  _ too _ often—Steve would drift off to sleep and wake up not long afterwards. “I think he’s forcing himself awake,” he told Bruce, “I found at least 8 empty cans of energy drinks in his apartment, and those are just the ones I saw. I don’t think they work on him, but...”

Steve, lying behind them, yelped. He turned fitfully and shouted something incomprehensible, clearly in the throes of a nightmare.

“I think you might be right,” Bruce replied. “If, for him, this is every night...”

“He thought we were in Camp Lehigh when I asked him where we were,” Tony said. “Not long before the Battle of New York, Steve was fighting in World War II—and as far as I’m aware, received no support from SHIELD before or after. Which he may have refused, but clearly he  _ shouldn’t have been able to.” _

“He crashed his plane into the ocean,” Bruce said, “when—he could have landed and been alright. So you take a guy who’s essentially at the tail end of a crisis and put him in a situation with no support, put him directly back into a war zone, and expect him not to spin out.”

Tony put his head in his hands as Steve began to thrash again. “How are we going to fix this?”

“In the end, Steve has to fix himself,” Bruce said. “I think you and I both understand that.”

Tony shook his head. “He’ll have to pull himself up, sure. But we have to catch him before he falls this far again.”

“Clint volunteered to clean his apartment,” Bruce said. “Said he didn’t want cleaners going in and working out what happened.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “That’s quite a job.”

“So he’s been telling me,” Bruce said. “He’s also offered to let Steve stay with him for a couple weeks or so. So he can get his footing.”

“After seeing the apartment,” Tony said, “really?”

Bruce shrugged. “Steve just generally wasn’t functioning,” he said. “The unplugged refrigerator—I wouldn’t be surprised if the cold was a PTSD trigger for him, or something like that. They’re probably going to do some kind of psych hold before they let him go. And me and Clint have both agreed he isn’t talking his way out of therapy.”

“This is my fault,” Tony muttered.

Bruce touched him on the shoulder. “Don’t start assigning blame,” he said. “It’ll kill you.”

Tony looked away. “Like this almost killed Steve.”


End file.
